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“Thanksgiving Day gone, the Christmas season with its busy shopping days approaches. In this respect Negroes of Harlem and vicinity will contribute their full share. The opportunity therefore presents itself for them to observe how much of this money spent is returned to them in the form of employment.”

My father wrote these words in a column dated Dec. 5, 1936, in which he lamented the fact that 75 percent of the patronage of businesses on 125th Street “comes from Negroes. Yet even the casual observer may note that Negroes comprise less than 25 percent of the employees on that street.”

Ebenezer chided Blumstein’s Department Store, one of his frequent targets, for its announcement in the black press the year before that it had employed “60 Harlemites” on its staff. He argued that it would be hard to find 60 black employees in Blumstein’s with a microscope and that some of those department store workers may well have lived in Harlem, but they were not black.

“Negroes are not interested in how many Harlemites the Blumstein store or other stores on 125th Street employ. They are interested in HOW MANY NEGROES ARE EMPLOYED. And we take this opportunity to tell these store owners that Negroes expect a commensurate share of employment as clerks in these stores during this Christmas season.”

Jobs and economic parity for black Americans are on the wish list this Christmas season as well. The national unemployment rate has declined to 7.7 percent. The rate of black unemployment, while lower than it was, is 13 percent.

“We African American civil rights and social justice leaders come together on the heels of another historic election — one in which African Americans played a crucial and decisive role in securing a second term for the Obama Administration, and in the outcomes of numerous U.S. Senate, U.S. House, gubernatorial, state legislative, mayoral and other races across the nation.

“We, the undersigned organizations are bound by our common goal to protect, promote and defend the rights, well-being and opportunity of 42 million African Americans.

“As we approach the 50th anniversary of the Great March on Washington and the 150th anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation, we must have a seat at the table to fully leverage the talents, intellectual capital and contributions of our leaders to craft a domestic agenda that brings African Americans closer to parity and equality, and fulfills the promise of these milestones.”

Just as my father wanted to ensure that neighborhood merchants did not take black Harlemites’ dollars for granted, black America expects that its considerable political clout be fully appreciated as well.

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